Reasons we are reborn as a family:

kindness, revenge, and debts.

The causes of affinity are manifold. The Buddha grouped them into four categories: to repay kindness, to exact revenge, to collect a debt, and to repay a debt. If a particular affinity is powerful, we’ll be reborn in the same family. If lighter, as friends. Lighter still? Then we’ll interact to some degree.

Say we had been kind to someone in past lifetimes, this person could now be in our family to repay that kindness. When we encounter trouble, she is the one helping us wholeheartedly.

What if we had been unkind? We will have a person who dislikes us, so often insulting and even slandering us. He has come for revenge.

If the person defrauds or robs us of our money or belongings, she is collecting a debt.

If someone helps us make money so that we become well off financially, he is repaying a debt.

Examples of cause and effect for the four basic kinds of affinities are numerous, but we can appreciate the general idea—we need to nurture good relationships and resolve enmities.

A time to test and a time to . . .

Compassion is aspiring to help all beings.

Wisdom is knowing how to help.

If, when empathizing with other’s suffering, we feel overwhelmed, we may reassure ourselves that at least we’re being compassionate. But even with good intentions, when we fail to employ wisdom, our efforts to help will likely prove ineffective and lead to our feeling disappointed and frustrated.

What we ordinary beings have yet to realize and thus so far failed to remedy, is that we invariably act from emotions. Rather than from wisdom. Oh, what tangled webs of emotion we weave. They overwhelm us to the point that not only are we unable to help others, we make things worse.

We may have empathy, but can we help others in a substantial way?

Will they be any closer to ending their suffering?

In our practice, instead of reacting blindly from emotions, we need to temper our compassion with wisdom. When we do this, we can begin to truly ease not just our own suffering but that of others as well.